Immigration and Customs Enforcement has 5,200 detainees in quarantine nationwide after they were exposed to either mumps or chicken pox, CNN reports.
Most of the people who were quarantined, about 4,200, were exposed to mumps, with about 800 exposed to chicken pox and 100 to both. ICE quarantines individuals for 25 days after the last incubation period.
ICE has confirmed 297 cases of mumps in its custody from September 2018 to June, 13 of this year. As of March 7, there were 2,287 detainees in quarantine due to “exposure to a detainee with a contagious condition.” The agency has about 52,000 adults in custody.
"I think there is heightened interest in this situation because it's the mumps, which is a new occurrence in custody, but preventing the spread of communicable disease in ICE custody is something we have demonstrated success doing," Nathalie Asher, ICE executive associate director for enforcement and removal operations, told CNN.
"From an operational perspective, the impact is significant in the short and long term and will result in an increase in cohorted detainees' length of stay in detention, an inability to effect removal of eligible cohorted detainees, and postponing scheduled consular interviews for quarantined detainees," she said.
An unnamed ICE official told CNN that an alert has been issued to staff.
"This week, the ICE Health Service Corps issued a reminder to senior field leadership reminding their staff to review vaccination records and take appropriate actions," the official said.